That sound you hear throughout the day and into the night comes to your ears all the way from Detroit, Michigan. It’s the sound of $46,296 per minute being flushed through General Motors’ toilets. Time.com published some of their theories regarding the wants/needs of and for a GM bailout. The Numbers you see below come from that article.
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16,000,000 – total U.S. auto sales in 2007
13,500,000 – expected total U.S. auto sales in 2008
2,000,000,000 – total cash spending, in USD, by General Motors every month
16,000,000,000 – …. and dwindling; total cash, in USD, held by General Motors
5,000,000,000 – USD saved by “throwing all manner of stuff overboard” such as retiree health benefits, workers, assets, and soon-coming designs
2,500,000,000 – total USD third-quarter loss for General Motors in 2008
10,000,000,000 – total USD needed by General Motors from the federal government to pay its bills in 2009
15,000,000,000 – total USD needed by General Motors from the federal government to close plants
54 – total plants in jeopardy (owned by GM, Ford, and Chrysler) in North America if bailout money isn’t secured, thus jeopardizing another 4,000 Tier 1 supplier plants that also supply some large Japanese manufacturers you may have heard about
240,000 – total direct employees of the Detroit Three last year
974,000 – total employees of the Detroit Three’s partsmakers and suppliers
1,700,000 – total (other) automotive-related workers who have jobs because of the 974,000 mentioned above; who have jobs because of the 240,000 above them
10 – likely unemployment figures, in percent, in the United States were the Detroit Three to come to a halt
12,000,000,000 – total cost, in USD, that Deutsche Bank figures General Motors would have to spend in order to compensate dealers who lose their stores and to chop labour costs and shutter plants
6,000,000,000 – total USD saved in operating costs were GM to spend $12,000,000,000 on getting rid of stuff
